It is commonly desired to carry a number of items together by hand at once. One such item for example, is a plastic shopping bag with integral plastic handle loops. The plastic loops do not fit the shape of a person's hand, and do not rest comfortably there and, therefore, it is difficult to carry large loads or several plastic bags together at one time. Similarly, paint cans often include a metal wire handle. While the handle may be inexpensive to apply to the cans, it is not comfortable to hold in the hand and is rarely large enough to allow more than two paint cans to be held in the hand at once. These items also present problems every time one desires to pick them up again after setting them down. The plastic handle loops of a typical carrying bag typically fall to the side in random directions so that the carrier must gather up all of the loops before the bags can be carried. The wire paint can handles similarly fall to the side and must also be collected together before the cans be carried.
British Patent No. 113,180 to Earle shows a carrier to make string tied parcels more comfortable to carry by hand. The carrier has a lower limb with corrugations so that if a number of parcels are to be carried at once, they can be distributed along the length of the limb to keep the parcels balanced. Although the carrier does allow several parcels to be carried at once, it requires careful attention on the part of the user to maintain the parcels balanced about the handle. In addition, to allow the carrier to bear heavier loads additional suspending links are added to support the lower limb at intermediate points along its, length, this makes it more difficult to disconnect the lower limb from the upper limb and also to engage the lower limb with parcel strings. If the carrier of Earle were allowed to bend, the purpose of the corrugations might be defeated.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,112,541 to Tretadis shows a handle for carrying bags of net or plastic material. The handle has a lower limb to secure and attach the bags to it by clamping them, however if the lower limb was to become unattached, the handle then would be unable to perform its designed purpose. This design is unable to carry items with nonflexible carrying handles.